


A Home Beyond the What Ifs

by Buffintruder



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Japan, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Chance Meetings, F/F, Japanese-American Character, Les Mis Ladies Week, National Identity Issues, Other, Trans Character, genderfluid Eponine, mixed race character
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-15
Updated: 2018-08-15
Packaged: 2019-06-26 23:07:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15673146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Buffintruder/pseuds/Buffintruder
Summary: Starting over in another country was never going to be easy, even in the best case scenario. Eponine still wasn't sure if Cosette’s presence made it a thousand times better or a thousand times more complicated. Probably both.





	A Home Beyond the What Ifs

**Author's Note:**

> Written for les mis ladies week. Minor warnings for non-sexual nudity and some description of dysphoria
> 
> None of these names are remotely Japanese, but as a fandom, we've been pretending these names are normal in pretty much every context, so I guess what's one more?

The hot water stung as Eponine sunk her feet into it. Once fully submerged, they quickly adjusted to the temperature, the tingling fading away until the once painful heat became soothing. She slowly lowered the rest of her body into the bath. The warmth seemed to flood into the very core of her body, relaxing every muscle and tense thought. Eponine, sore and exhausted from a long day of work, thought that she could probably fall asleep like this. She closed her eyes and let her mind detach.

“Excuse me, miss?” Barely five seconds had passed before a voice startled her out of her rest.

Instinctively, Eponine flinched away.

“I noticed that you left your towel by the showers.” The girl speaking to her slid into the water a couple feet away, sitting down on the stone bench that lined the sides of the large rectangular bath.

Eponine glanced around her, and sure enough, she didn’t have the towel she had brought in with her.

“Oh, um, thank you.” Eponine took the towel from her. It was one of the small ones,something meant to dry a face rather than a whole body. It was the only thing she had taken with her instead of leaving behind in the lockers with the rest of her stuff.

“It was no problem.” The girl had a beautiful smile that seemed to radiate friendliness. She was also completely naked, but since this was an onsen, a public bath, and nobody was wearing any clothes, it almost wasn’t awkward.

“Still, thank you for noticing,” Eponine said, feeling a little bit embarrassed for having made such a careless mistake like forgetting about one of her belongings. She glanced at the row of stools and showerheads, divided into little sections by knee-high stone slabs. She must have left it there, too distracted by her tiredness to notice.

“Oh, you have a little accent,” the girl said. “Are you American?”

Eponine wanted to feel irritated at the girl for intruding on her peace with personal questions, but she seemed too genuinely nice. “No, but I grew up there. I only moved back here a year ago.”

“Really? That’s interesting. Is it nice there?” the girl had her head tilted ever so slightly, and Eponine had to stop herself from considering it cute.

Eponine shrugged. She didn’t have many good memories from there, but most of it hadn’t been the fault of the country. “I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”

“Sorry, I’m Cosette.” She reached out to shake Eponine’s hand, her cheeks darkening slightly.

“Eponine,” she replied. 

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be rude,” Cosette said quickly. “It’s just that my biological father is American, and I was curious. You don’t have to answer though. I can leave you to finish your bath in peace.”

“No, that's fine,” Eponine said before she could stop herself.

Although Cosette had light brown skin, some of her facial features seemed more European and her hair was slightly lighter than black, Eponine noticed. 

Her question seemed more vulnerable in light of this new information. It no longer seemed like she was just asking some random stranger intrusive questions about the country itself. Eponine thought that maybe she was trying to piece together an as-of-yet unknown aspect of her heritage and past, and Eponine could sympathize with that.

Eponine wanted to think of a good answer to Cosette’s question, but was forced to settle on, “I’d tell you if I could, but it’s hard to describe an entire country.”

“I see.” Cosette thought about it for a moment. “I suppose if someone who had never been to this Japan asked me what it was like, I wouldn’t even know where to begin to describe it.”

Eponine nodded. “Exactly.” A moment passed. “It’s cooler than here, at least where I lived.”

Cosette laughed ruefully. “It’s been pretty hot this summer, hasn’t it? It isn’t even August yet.”

“This gets worse?” Eponine demanded disbelievingly. It had been so long since she had lived in this area, and her childhood memory must have lied to her when it said the summers were tolerable.

“I’m afraid it does. Not too much worse, but still.”

“I get soaked in sweat just walking to work and back,” Eponine said, then immediately wished she could take back those words. The information kind of gross to share with someone she just met. 

However, Cosette continued on, not even acknowledging any potential cause of embarrassment. “And yet here we are in an onsen, willingly subjecting ourselves to more heat.”

“It’s strangely relaxing,” Eponine admitted, “even if I should be tired of being hot by now.”

“I think it’s the water,” Cosette said. “Warm water is always comfortable, no matter the time of year.”

“That’s true,” Eponine said, wondering why talking to this person about the  _ weather _ of all things was interesting or why she didn’t want to end this conversation. “I don’t know what I would do without water.”

“Die?” Cosette suggested.

“Probably,” Eponine agreed.

“Only probably?”

“You never know, do you?” Eponine teased, raising her eyebrows slightly

“Science would disagree, but not me,” Cosette said, another beautiful grin spreading across her face. “Who am I to say what the universe contains?”

It was a fair point, and Eponine wasn’t sure what to say in response.

They sat in silence for a little longer, and since they didn’t know each other very well it was a bit awkward. Eponine wasn’t sure if she should say something or not. Eventually, she said, “It’s getting late, so I should go soon. It was nice talking to you.”

“Have a good evening,” Cosette replied. “Enjoy that hot, hot weather on your way home.”

Eponine snorted. “You too.”

...

After waking up to an alarm clock at 5:00 a couple mornings later, Eponine already knew that it was going to be a bad day. First of all, there was the early hour and the full day of work that Eponine knew was ahead. And second of all, today he felt male in the most obnoxious way a gender could be. 

Though Eponine considered himself genderfluid, on most days he didn’t feel any gender very strongly. This was not one of those times. He was overwhelmingly  _ male _ , and he couldn’t bear being seen any other way. 

For once, Eponine thought he could understand the feeling of being “trapped in a body”, as the trans narrative was often known to cis people. He felt encased by flesh that felt heavy and wrong in every way. If he could become a ghost of shapeless consciousness simply to avoid the physicality of his self, he would choose that in a heartbeat. 

The thought of going to work, where everybody would only see the part of him that he found so unbearable was crushing.

Even though he wasn’t living in America anymore, and the law required him to be given 10 days of paid leave per year, he had used most of them up a few months before with a horrible case of flu. Eponine knew he would regret it later if he started using up the rest of his days for something that probably wouldn’t even last the whole time he would be at work. He couldn't miss a day of work for this.

Eponine reluctantly dragged himself out of bed and began getting dressed in his uniform as quickly as he could, carefully trying not to disturb Gavroche sleeping a few feet away. 

He considered wearing his binder, but he was going to be on a long shift. When he returned, Gavroche would be back home from school and see his flat chest and know that he had been wearing a binder for longer than was healthy. Eponine didn’t want his brother to be disappointed in him. He chose his tightest sports bra instead. 

The uniforms, at least, were baggy and loose enough to not make anything stand out too much. He could tuck his shoulder-length hair into his cap, and if he spoke in a lower tone of voice, he might seem androgynous if nobody looked too closely. Another benefit of living in Japan was that cashiers weren’t expected to smile or make small talk much, just to greet customers politely.

Still half-asleep, Eponine stumbled out of his apartment to the 24/7 FamilyMart a couple streets away. It was the second closest Kombini—convenience store—and he made it there in about five minutes. 

Only a few customers came there so early in the morning, leaving Eponine a long time to his unhappy thoughts. Eventually, the morning rush picked up and another cashier joined him at the counter. The hours continued slowly and uneventfully. 

His dysphoria faded slightly so that it was only extremely unpleasant rather than actual torture, and Eponine was starting to feel like maybe he should have taken the day off after all.

Halfway through the morning, just before the start of the lunch rush, Cosette walked in. 

Because they had met in the local community onsen, Eponine had figured that she probably lived nearby, but in all his four months of working at this Kombini, he had never seen her there, so this was hardly an expected occurrence.

And of all days for Cosette to drop in during his shift, it had to be this one, when he felt too exhausted, too dysphoric, too weary with the world to interact with someone as warm and bright as Cosette.

There was an older man with her that Eponine assumed was her father until she remembered that Cosette’s biological father was American. “American” without any further specifications usually meant white to Japanese people, so he didn’t think it was super likely for her to be referring to him, though still not impossible.

Maybe the man was Cosette’s grandfather, though he seemed a little young for that, or maybe Cosette had two dads, or she was adopted, or it could be something else completely.

With a start, Eponine realized that he was wondering about something that really wasn’t any of his business, so he tried to push his thoughts in a different direction. Like the reason Cosette was currently in this shop despite not regularly coming to it, except, no, that was still prying.

He was saved from having to redirect his thoughts away from Cosette when the person in question walked up to the counter with a shopping basket full of everything someone would want for a lunch with two people.

Cosette recognized him instantly, despite his vastly different appearance. “Eponine! I didn’t expect to see you again so soon.”

Despite his hesitations, Eponine couldn’t help but feel a little lighter at her smile. His responding grin wasn’t entirely faked when he replied, “Yeah, me neither.”

“Papa,” Cosette said turning to the older man. That answered one of Eponine’s questions at least. “This is the person I told you about earlier, from the onsen.”

Eponine couldn’t help but turn a little pink, both at the implication that he had made a big enough impression on Cosette for her to tell her father and because of the scrutinizing look the old man was giving him. He felt like all his secrets and bad thoughts were laid bare beneath this man’s judgemental glare.

But the man smiled, and his gaze softened. In a tone that was much warmer than his intimidating demeanor, he said, “It’s a pleasure to met you, Eponine-san.” Eponine took a moment to thank any higher powers that existed for the fact that Japanese had a gender neutral honorific and so he wouldn’t have to be called Ms. or some equivalent. “I am Fauchelevent.”

Another customer went up to the other side of the counter where the other cashier was working. Eponine guiltily realized that he hadn’t exactly been doing his job and quickly began scanning the items that Cosette and Fauchelevent were buying, placing them in a bag. 

“You don’t normally come to this Kombini, do you?” he asked.

Cosette shook her head. “There’s another one closer to where we live, but this was on the way to the park. We’re having a picnic to celebrate the start of my summer break.”

He hadn’t known Cosette was a student, but he had finished bagging their things before he had the chance to continue the conversation. “I hope you enjoy your picnic,” Eponine said instead.

“Thank you,” Fauchelevent replied.

“Have a good day,” Cosette said, giving another of her dazzling smiles.

Eponine watched them go, thinking that even though it was too late for a  _ good  _ day, Cosette’s surprise appearance had certainly made it a less terrible one.

...

It was exactly one week since Eponine had first met Cosette, and so, hoping that she was a person of habit, Eponine went back to the onsen. 

Eponine wasn’t exactly female that day (her gender was more of a flat nothing, too apathetic to even be considered nonexistent), but thankfully her dysphoria was low enough that gender-separated baths wouldn’t really bother her. Words like ‘she’ and ‘her’ and ‘woman’ didn’t feel right, but they didn’t feel bad either, as long as she didn’t think too hard about what they really meant. 

Still, if it wasn’t for the hopes of seeing Cosette again, she probably wouldn’t have gone back. The onsen cost money, and Eponine didn’t consider it worth it if she wasn’t getting the most enjoyment possible out of it.

In the locker room, there were a fair amount of people, but no Cosette. Eponine showered, put her soap and shampoo in the lockers, and got into the large bath without seeing Cosette. She was just starting to contemplate checking the outdoor tub again when Cosette finally entered. Noticing Eponine immediately, Cosette rinsed quickly and made her way to Eponine.

“Hello!” Cosette greeted. “I was hoping I would see you here again.”

Strangely delighted that Cosette would look forward to seeing her, Eponine said, “Good thing we both had that same thought.”

Cheeks darkening, Cosette sat down besides Eponine. “It is,” she agreed.

“We need a better way to find each other than relying on chance meetings.” Eponine’s heart was beating the tiniest bit faster, but her mind had turned its focus on Cosette too thoroughly to pay much attention to that.

“But don’t you think chance meetings are more romantic?” Cosette teased.

Eponine’s heart stopped. Had Cosette just said what Eponine thought she had said? The Japanese version of the English word romantic, romantiku? Surely that word didn’t have all the exact connotations as it did in English. Maybe Cosette had meant something along the lines of a capital-R Romantic? Eponine wasn’t entirely certain what Romantic was, but she knew that it did not describe the kind of love that lowercase-r romantic did.

“I think a cell phone number wouldn’t hurt,” Eponine managed.

Cosette laughed. “Okay. Once we get out of here, we can exchange them?”

“Sure,” Eponine said. There was a brief pause as that conversation thread came to it’s end, before she said, “You mentioned you were a student, right?”

Over the course of the following thirty minutes, Eponine learned that Cosette was in her third year of college, majoring in Communications. She wanted to improve the state of Japan, and she worked with a politically minded group to do so. They dealt with issues that included the rights that various marginalized people were denied; the imperialism, racism, sexism, and other harmful views and beliefs that the country liked to pretend didn’t exist; and the growing gap between the rich and the poor.

On a more personal level, Cosette also enjoyed going on walks with her father, especially in gardens since she loved flowers, even if that was a bit cheesy. Her favorite genre was science fiction, though mystery came in at a close second. She was adopted and had never known her birth family.

In turn, Eponine revealed that she was pretty close to fluent when it came to speaking and understanding Japanese, though there were many less commonly spoken words that she didn’t know. However, she didn’t know how to read or write it until she started learning it a couple months before she moved to the country. 

She had three brothers and one sister, but only the oldest of the boys had come with her. (Eponine did not say that the youngest two had been given up for adoption as young children and that she didn’t know where they were, nor did she give the reason why she and Gavroche had moved to Japan without their parents. As nice as Cosette was, they had only met a week ago.)

In Japan, she had discovered a surprising love for warabimochi, even though Eponine was not normally a huge fan of sweet food. She loved every kind of book she could get her hands on, but she generally liked light-hearted ones more than depressing ones.

By that point in the conversation, Eponine had become warmed to the core, and staying in the water felt uncomfortably hot. Through the rippling, clear water, she could tell that her toes were becoming wrinkled.

Cosette apparently felt similarly because she suggested getting out and exchanging phone numbers. Eponine agreed, and once they were dried and dressed, she put her number into Cosette’s phone. Almost immediately, she received a smiley face text.

Uncertain of how to respond to that in a language she only partially knew, Eponine sent a smiley face back, surprising herself at the uncharacteristicness of her action. Beside Eponine, Cosette grinned delightedly at her.

Blushing a little, Eponine said, “I should be going, but I hope we can meet again soon.”

“Me too!” Cosette replied, still gazing fondly at her. “We should meet up some time.”

“Absolutely,” Eponine said.

The memory of Cosette’s smile refused to leave or stop warming her heart as Eponine left.

...

During the evening of the next day, Eponine received a text from Cosette. As ne had been working that day (Eponine was feeling very strongly a gender that was neither female nor male), ne had been debating when to talk to Cosette and what would be a good thing to say. Now that Cosette had made the first move, it turned out nir worries were unnecessary.

Eagerly, Eponine opened the message, only to come face to face with writing ne couldn’t understand. Ne recognized the characters for ‘go’ and ‘brother’ and ‘father’. Since it ended in with a question mark, Eponine thought Cosette might be asking if ne wanted to go somewhere, possibly with Gavroche and Fauchelevent, but Eponine wasn’t sure. 

Insides churning with humiliation, ne slowly typed out in the phonetic alphabet a reminder that ne didn’t know written Japanese very well.

A minute later, Eponine received a call from Cosette which ne nervously answered. “Hello?”

“I’m so sorry about that,” Cosette started. She sounded genuinely apologetic, but somehow that almost made it worse. “You told me yesterday that you couldn’t read Japanese well, but somehow I forgot. I’m so sorry.”

“It’s fine.” Eponine’s face was burning, and ne didn’t want the awkwardness of the situation to last any longer than it had to. “What did you text me about?”

“Um, I was asking if you wanted to come with me and my dad to the summer festival tomorrow? You could bring your younger brother too.”

“Give me a moment,” Eponine flipped open nir calendar. Ne was working the next day, but only until 6:30.

“Sure, I can make it,” Eponine said. Ne was happy to have the chance to see Cosette again, even if this entire conversation felt like it had been a mess. “Would 7:00 or 7:30 work?”

“Yeah!” Cosette said, and Eponine could hear the relief in her voice.

“Good. I’ll ask Gavroche if he wants to come. I can’t think of any reason why he would refuse though. Where should we meet?”

Cosette gave nem instructions to a corner a block away from the festival where they could meet up at.

“I don’t have to wear a kimono, do I?” Eponine asked, concerned. Ne didn’t have any, nor did ne have the time or money to buy one and learn how to put it on. Ne wasn’t sure what a festival would entail, but it sounded like a more traditional event.

“You can wear a yukata if you want, but at least half the people show up in their everyday clothes,” Cosette reassured nem.

“Okay,” Eponine said. “Well, um, thanks for inviting me to this.”

“No problem!” Cosette said. “I’m sorry about the texting thing—I’ll be sure to call you next time. See you tomorrow!”

The call ended, and Eponine set down nir phone, nir heart beating faster than normal.

Ne loved talking to Cosette and was glad to have another opportunity to see her, but that conversation had been tainted with humiliation, and Eponine was just relieved it was over. Next time they met, ne would probably pretend the whole text debacle had never happened.

With a sigh, Eponine walked into the bedroom ne shared with Gavroche. He was doing something on his phone with his earphones tucked in, completely oblivious to nir presence.

“Gavroche?”

He looked up, pausing to pull out one of his headphones. “What’s up?” he asked in English, the language he usually used around nem.

In general, Eponine stuck to speaking Japanese. Ne tried very hard, maybe too hard, to readjust to Japan, as if ne could fool everybody else into thinking ne had lived there nir whole life, maybe ne could fool nemself; as if that would erase nir parents and everything that had happened while ne lived in America.

Gavroche did not see things that way. He had lived his whole life in the US, and Japanese was still harder and stranger for him than it was for Eponine. It had bothered nem at first, like he wasn’t trying to fit into this new life hard enough, but ne knew that it was difficult transition for both of them to make and there was a comfort to speaking and hearing a familiar language. People coped in different ways, and it wasn’t like Japanese was any less tied up with her parents than English was.

“Have you heard of the summer festival?” Eponine asked.

“Yeah,” Gavroche said, continuing his English. “Some kids at school talked about going to one this weekend. Why?”

“I got invited to go with someone tomorrow, and she invited you too.”

Gavroche frowned. “Who? You didn’t mention meeting anybody.”

Eponine nearly hesitated, but there was no good reason to want to keep this from Gavroche. “Cosette. We met at the onsen.”

Gavroche raised an eyebrow, but Eponine refused to blush. “Sure.”

“Okay,” Eponine said, already retreating from the room. “I’ll let her know we’re both coming.”

Gavroche had seemed a little unenthusiastic, acting less than his lively self. He had been more like than since they had moved. Eponine wasn’t sure if it was a good thing. It might be that Gavroche no longer felt the need to constantly put up a cheerful front to deal with his awful life, but it might also mean that he was unhappy here. 

Over a year ago, they had both agreed that starting over completely would be the best option for both of them, but sometimes Eponine wondered if Gavroche ever regretted it.

Ne had always tried to shield him from the worst of what their parents did, tried to make the transition of switching countries as easy as ne could, to give him a life that was as normal as possible. Gavroche hadn’t had that before, but he didn’t exactly have that now either. Maybe there never could be any sort of normalcy for forever foreigners.

...

The first thing Eponine noticed about the festival was the noise. Even from a couple blocks away, they could hear a lively percussive beat above the sound of cicadas and passing cars. While it caused Eponine’s trepidation to increase, Gavroche seemed to grow a little more upbeat, a little more life filling each step.

By now, the sun had set, and the heat of the day no longer was oppressive. The choking humidity was now almost comforting, and the thick air surrounded Eponine like a blanket. With their binder on (today was not a high dysphoria day, but it was strong enough that they felt better with a binder), Eponine was only uncomfortably hot rather than almost literally dying. During the walk, their hair had begun to stick around their forehead with sweat, but their shirt remained mostly dry.

As Eponine and Gavroche turned around their last corner, the concentration of people, especially people in yukata, suddenly increased. The music had grown stronger, and Eponine could now hear the twang of a string instrument they did not know the name of, the voice of a singer warbling above it all.

A memory struck Eponine so suddenly and sharply that they halted in the middle of the sidewalk, almost causing a bicyclist to crash into them. 

This music, the noise of the crowds, the night and the humidity, this was  _ familiar _ . It had been so long that they hadn’t even remembered it, but now that they did, they couldn’t think of anything else.

“Ep?” Gavroche asked uncertainly. “Are you alright?” He spoke in Japanese, as he usually did in public.

Eponine tried to shake off the horribly nostalgic feeling. “Yeah. I just remembered. I’ve been to one of these before, back before we moved.”

“Oh,” Gavroche said, looking a different kind of worried.

“It doesn’t matter,” Eponine said, trying to convince themself of this fact. “It was a long time ago, and it wasn’t a bad memory.”

Their parents had been running a stall, Eponine remembered with sudden clarity. They couldn’t quite remember what that stall had been. In retrospect, it was probably something a little shady, but when they were young, they hadn’t cared about their parents business. They just loved the food and the music and the people. 

They hadn’t realized how much they missed this, of being part of this community and shared excitement, of feeling like they belonged there, until this moment.

Someone waving at them caught Eponine’s attention from the corner of their eye, and they turned to see Cosette, a grin on her face. Her wavy hair was pulled up, held together by a metal clasp with a flower on it that matched the pink flowers on her black yukata. In this moment, Eponine was pretty sure that they had never seen anyone as beautiful before, and it was possible that they stared for a second before they recovered enough to wave back.

Gavroche followed Eponine’s gaze. “That’s Cosette?”

Nodding, Eponine crossed the street to join up with Cosette and her father. After exchanging a quick round of greetings and introductions, the four of them walked through the scattered people and bikes to enter through the gates leading to the local middle school where the festival took place.

Inside, the lights seemed brighter and warmer, and colored lanterns hung from four ropes stretching from the corners of the courtyard to the roofed square platform in the center. Around it were a couple dozen dancers, mostly older women wearing matching yukata with about three or four different designs between them, but there were a few other people among them as well.

A row of stalls formed a square around them, offering food and games, while a few people and about a hundred bikes were parked beyond that.

It all seemed too small, nothing like the grand place Eponine remembered as a six year old, yet the noise and crowds felt overwhelming. They didn’t know where to start in this chaos.

Gavroche, easily affected by the energy of crowds, was grinning, delighted by everything around him. “Can we get some food?” he asked over the noise of throng, even though they had already eaten dinner.

“Sure,” Eponine said, glancing at Cosette and her father for confirmation. Nearby, something was baking, and the smell of it was rather tempting.

Cosette was nodding. “Yeah, food is a good place to start. Do you want to look around for what you want to eat?”

“Yeah!” Gavroche said.

The four of them finally began moving, working their way around the ring of stalls. There were a lot of people—some in t-shirts and shorts, some in yukatas, and some in everything in between—but the crowd wasn’t uncomfortably dense, especially in the gap between the dancers and those waiting in lines at the stalls.

“What if we got—” Gavroche halted, then switched to English. “Ep, how do you say cotton candy?”

Eponine thought for a second, but they couldn’t bring the Japanese word to mind. “...sugar cloud?”

“Watagashi?” Cosette tried, and it sounded familiar, so Eponine hoped that they were on the same page.

“There is some being sold over there,” Cosette’s father said, his voice just barely audible over the background noise. He nodded towards a stall a few meters away.

They all quickly joined the line, though Eponine had no plans of buying any for themself. Valjean did not get any cotton candy either, though he did seem to know the person selling it pretty well, and they spent a few moments talking.

In the humidity, a little water quickly condensed on the cotton candy, forming strands of crystallized sugar trailing down the sides like spiderwebs. Eponine thought it looked pretty cool, but Gavroche ate his rather quickly, and within a minute he was left with nothing but a pair of the wooden disposable chopsticks that the sugar had been spun around.

Cosette spent a bit more time savoring her own, even offering Eponine a bite. They politely refused, but for some reason, they felt a bit warmer inside at the offer.

“So. Um, those dancers look nice,” Eponine said quickly to cover up their embarrassment.

“Do you want to join them?” Cosette asked, grinning lightly.

“I don’t know how to do the dance,” Eponine said. The dancers’ movements were choreographed, so this was not something Eponine could jump into, even if they were the kind of person who enjoyed spontaneous dancing in front of strangers.

“It’s not hard to learn,” Cosette said. “See, they repeat the steps every few measures.”

“Uhh...”

“Come on!” Cosette tugged on Eponine’s hand, and suddenly they found that they couldn’t possibly refuse her.

“Alright.” Eponine glanced at Gavroche, but he vehemently shook his head.

“You can do whatever, but not me,” he said.

“Don’t worry,” Valjean said. “I’ll keep an eye on him. How do you feel about playing a game and winning a prize?”

“I can take care of myself,” Gavroche insisted. “But sure. Are there any games you’re really good at?”

“My aim isn’t bad,” Valjean said, already leading Gavroche away.

Cosette gently pulled Eponine into the circle of dancers next to a couple of kids. They were clearly not practiced at this dance either, but they seemed to be having a lot of fun.

“Just copy one of the ladies in the white yukata,” Cosette called to Eponine over the noise of the music. “They know what they’re doing.”

Following her own advice, Cosette watched the person in front of her, mirroring their movements. Though she was often half a beat behind, she moved with a grace that Eponine knew they could never replicate.

It struck Eponine then, as they clumsily tried to mimic the dance, that this was a person they could fall in love with. Under the warm lantern lights, Cosette almost seemed to be glowing with joy and excitement. 

Everytime she caught Eponine’s eye, she smiled brightly, and Eponine was certain they had never seen anyone more lovely. Eponine had known Cosette was beautiful since the moment they first saw her, but at that moment, they realized that the word was not powerful enough to describe all that Cosette was.

There were a hundred reasons why developing a crush on Cosette was a bad idea, starting with possible transphobia and homophobia, and ending with Eponine’s responsibilities to supporting themself and Gavroche, but right then, Eponine couldn’t bring themself to care about any of it. 

Cosette was breathtaking, Gavroche was having more fun than he had in awhile, the festival was exciting, and for now, life was perfect

**Author's Note:**

> Some fun trivia: Eponine calls the public bath that she meets Cosette at an onsen. Since the baths there are filled with heated tap water (rather than water from hot springs), the place would actually be a sento, not an onsen. However, in the Kansai region, where this story takes place, people tend to call both onsen, so Eponine is sort of right.


End file.
